Outcomes of the Second International Conference on Pediatric Mechanical Circulatory Support Systems and Pediatric Cardiopulmonary Perfusion

The primary outcome of the Second International Conference was the September-October 2006 issue of the ASAIO Journal, which was dedicated to articles from manuscripts submitted before, during, and after the conference. This group of manuscripts was peer-reviewed according to ASAIO Journal guidelines and accepted for publication. Articles published in this special issue cover several critical areas of pediatric cardiopulmonary research including clinical, experimental, and transitional research.1–29 In particular, several leading investigators shared their experiences with clinical management and outcomes of pediatric patients during acute and chronic mechanical circulatory support.1–16 Special reports covered plasma proteomics in pediatric cardiac surgery18 as well as viscoelastic properties of blood of experimental animals for pediatric mechanical support device evaluations.19 Novel engineering designs of polymeric heart valves20 and the PediPump21 were also included. Several articles on pulsatile versus non-pulsatile perfusion3,10,23,24 during acute and chronic support were covered along with five interesting case reports in this special issue.25–29 Several other articles30–47 that were peer-reviewed and accepted after the deadline for the September-October issue or were delayed because of page limitations appeared in the November-December 2006 issue30–39 and in the present January-February 200740–47 issue of the Journal. Evaluations of the Second Conference In a survey forum, participants of the Second Conference were asked to evaluate not only the scientific program including invited speakers but also other aspects of this event such as location, social program, and so forth. All categories received very high scores. The Cost of the Second Conference The total cost of this event was $150,099. Penn State Children's Hospital and Penn State College of Medicine covered a substantial portion ($57,572), and the author used his personal funds ($35,072) to pay part of the deficit. The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (via R13 Grant proposal), Berlin Heart AG, Elsevier, Levitronix LLC, Lippincott Williams and Wilkins, MEDOS, Inc., MicroMed Technology, Inc., and Sorin Group Italia made educational grants to our conference. Third International Conference After experiencing two highly successful meetings, the organizers decided to hold this unique event annually. The Third International conference will be held in the Hotel Hershey, in Hershey, Pennsylvania, May 17 to 19, 2007. The Preliminary Scientific Program as well as all other related information can be found at the conference web page (www.hmc.psu.edu/ce/pediatrics). Finally, the conference organizers' special thanks go to Betty L. Littleton, BA, Managing Editor, and Joseph B. Zwischenberger, MD, Editor-in-Chief of the ASAIO Journal, for dedicating their time and energies in making this special issue possible. Acknowledgment of the Manuscript Reviewers Dozens of investigators agreed to review the manuscripts for this special issue. We appreciate very much their time and expertise. Following is the list of reviewers. Salvatore Agati, MD Atif Akcevin, MD Tijen Alkan, MD Tim Baldwin, PhD Steven Conrad, MD Oguz Coskun, MD Adrian Crucean, MD Long Cun, MD Sabine H. Däbritz, MD Edward Darling, MS, CCP Steven Deutsch, PhD Brian Duncan, MD Pirooz Eghtesady, MD, PhD Harald Eichstaedt, MD William J. Federspiel, PhD Olivier Ghez, MD Carmen Giacomuzzi, CCP Colleen Gruenwald, CCP Ronald Hirschl, MD Steven Koenig, PhD Bingyang Ji, MD Tigran Khalapyan, MD Choon Hak Lim, MD Kenneth N. Litwak, DVM, PhD Matthias Loebe, MD, PhD Sanjay Mehta, MD Carmelo Mignosa, MD John L. Myers, MD William S. Pierce, MD Olaf Reinhartz, MD Nils Reiss, MD Gerson Rosenberg, PhD Joerg S. Sachweh, MD Christof Schmid, MD Keith Scott, MD Brigitte Stiller, MD, PhD Kyung Sun, MD, PhD Akif Ündar, PhD Kent E. Vrana, PhD Rui Wang, MS Wei Wang, MD, PhD William J. Weiss, PhD Karl F. Welke, MD Conrad M. Zapanta, PhD Deming Zhu, MD Akif Ündar